The office at a Maddox presentation centre in Vancouver. Two employees of real estate marketing firm MAC Marketing Solutions posed as Chinese buyers for TV crews at the Cressey Developments building.

Photograph by: GLENN BAGLO
, Vancouver Sun

Real estate marketing company MAC Marketing Solutions has apologized for misleading the public after two employees posed as potential real estate buyers from China in two TV news stories.

“I regret very much that we are in this situation and that we were not forthright about the two young women featured in the story and their association with MAC,” said Cameron McNeill, president at MAC Marketing Solutions. “I take the full responsibility — I’m wearing this.”

Both CTV and CBC carried news stories this weekend about the Chinese New Year being a popular time to buy real estate. Chris Lee and her sister Amanda posed as two women shopping for a new apartment at Cressey Developments’ Maddox development in downtown Vancouver while in town for the Chinese New Year.

McNeill said both of the women are MAC employees and they are not sisters. He said he doesn’t know yet exactly what happened, but that he will take action, including disciplinary action if necessary, to ensure that nothing like this ever happens again.

“I feel terrible that we are in this situation,” McNeill said. “I don’t know all the details about what precisely happened that day. I want to get to the bottom of this. I don’t know if it was an overzealous employee or if this happened in a formalized way.”

He said he was out of town for the Family Day long weekend, but that he takes full responsibility. The two women are “pretty shaken up” and they have received hate mail, he said.

“You can imagine that as the owner of the business, I am juggling trying to protect their privacy, but also to discover how this came about so that it never happens again,” McNeill said.

The blog Whispers from the Village on the edge of the Rainforest, run by an anonymous blogger, began questioning the authenticity of Amanda Lee on Tuesday, noting that MAC Marketing Solutions has an administrative assistant named Amanda Lee, a fact the blogger discovered through her LinkedIn profile.

Tyler Davies, communications officer at the Real Estate Council of British Columbia, said he had never heard of any situation similar to this before, but that as the provincial regulating body for realtors, the council does have the authority to impose fines or to suspend or cancel real estate licences.

“We were alerted to this by another media outlet,” Davies said. “We are aware of it and the real estate council has commenced an investigation into this matter.”

McNeill said he will cooperate fully in any investigation.

“I’ve always tried my best to be very honest,” McNeill said. “If we need to address this with the council, of course, we will be fully cooperative and try to discover how this came about.”

In response to heated complaints on MAC Marketing’s Facebook page the company posted the following comment: “Chinese New Year is indeed a busy time across many of our communities. Last year at Maddox we experienced increased sales volume during our Chinese New Year efforts and this year have already sold a number of homes with several more expected. We do admit we should have been more transparent about the fact that a MAC Marketing Solutions employee was included in this story. We apologize for any misunderstanding that this may have resulted in.”

In the B.C. CTV news story, Amanda Lee is not quoted, but Chris Lee is. She says: “We like this place, we have to talk to our parents, they (will) make the decision,” and “We cannot afford that house by ourselves.” In the CBC news story, she says: “If we like this place, we have to tell them and they (will) make the decision,” and “Buying a home is really a big decision. In Chinese tradition, if you make good decisions at the beginning of this year and the whole year, it will be good luck.”

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